


you've got time to grow

by defcontwo



Series: you're an enigma, grasshopper [2]
Category: Batgirl (Comics), DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Robin (Comics)
Genre: Coming Out, Gen, new 52 what new 52 we die like chuck dixon's robin run
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-15 23:55:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15424458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/defcontwo/pseuds/defcontwo
Summary: “You know, I had this whole speech planned about how I’m Batgirl and you can just stick that in your pipe and shove it or some other equally mixed but pissed off metaphor, but you don’t have your condescending Tim Knows Best face on, so I’m guessing that’s not why I’m here.”Tim plucks at a stray thread in the knee of his jeans, and huffs. “Do I really have a condescending Tim Knows Best face?”Steph nudges him in the shoulder. “Please. It’s like your default face. You might want to get that checked out.”





	you've got time to grow

**Author's Note:**

> so i apparently wrote this story as a sequel to "there's a crack in everything," and just like, never posted it? five years ago. i wrote this five years ago and never posted it. i don't know! maybe i put it up on tumblr? it's a mystery. 
> 
> anyways, i took the old doc and cleaned it up/fleshed it out a little more. 
> 
> so hey, y'all. long time, no gotham.

_Meet me where you threw the first brick. Sunset._

The message is cryptic and to the point, which is just so totally Tim that Steph can’t decide if the tight feeling in her chest is fond or a slow-burning annoyance. Jesus Christ, Tim, would it kill you to turn off the Bat for one fucking second. 

But she got the message loud and clear, anyways. He knew that she would. 

Steph spends all day thinking about it, picking it apart -- nine words, thirty-seven characters, that’s all she’s got and she can take it and run, can imagine all of the terrible, frustrating arguments that come along with it. She stares at the whiteboard, unseeing, all the way through her Intro to Stats lecture, tapping her pencil against the tiny, awkward left-handed desk that she got stuck with when she slunk into class late. 

Because she can guess what this is about, right, this is about Batgirl and how she can’t do it and about how he’s worried about her again, and Steph’s so sick of this bullshit, she could scream. She’s landed on death’s doorstep two times over by now, and made it all the way back swinging, every time. Gotham’s not getting rid of her any time soon and this city’s a helluva lot pickier than all of the Bats combined. 

So, when will it be enough? When will she have proved herself enough? 

By the time Steph makes her way to the meeting point, her beaten-up purple docs finding purchase on crumbling brick and rusting metal as she lifts herself up onto the roof of the abandoned old auto factory, she’s wound herself all the way up and she’s about ready to take a brick to Tim’s face again. 

Except. 

Except when she gets there, she finds Tim sitting on the rooftop with his legs pulled up to his chest, all grease-covered jeans and worn out Star Trek t-shirt, and he looks so nervous that this can’t possibly be about Batgirl. He hugs his knees, hands twisted, and gives her a small, thin-lipped smile, the kind that usually means he would kinda rather be throwing up. It’s weird, how she still knows that. 

She knows all of his tells, still. 

Steph kicks out a foot, the toe of her docs tapping lightly against the toe of Tim’s chucks, and grins. “Hey, Doc, how’s it hanging?” 

Tim rolls his eyes up at her, but his smile gets a little more real, which was exactly the reaction she was looking for. 

Steph collapses onto the ground next to him, sitting cross-legged, and grabs a hair-tie off her wrist to tame her curly blonde hair. She always forgets how fucking windy it gets this close to the docks. 

She waits for a beat, and then another, to see if Tim is gonna be the one to start, and then blows out a breath. “You know, I had this whole speech planned about how I’m Batgirl and you can just stick that in your pipe and shove it or some other equally mixed but pissed off metaphor, but you don’t have your condescending Tim Knows Best face on, so I’m guessing that’s not why I’m here.” 

Tim plucks at a stray thread in the knee of his jeans, and huffs. “Do I really have a condescending Tim Knows Best face?”

Steph nudges him in the shoulder. “Please. It’s like your default face. You might want to get that checked out.” 

“I’ll be sure to make an appointment with Leslie,” Tim says, dry as ever, but now his smile is all the way there, so Steph knows she must be doing something right.

“Yeah, maybe she can give you like, a cream for that or something,” Steph says, nudging him again, just because it’s fun, because he’s there and she’s missed him, actually, kind of a lot more than she wanted to admit. “Soooooo, why am I here? Why the urgent meeting?” 

“Uh,” Tim says, suddenly clamming up again. “There’s a thing? I want to tell you?”

Steph clears her throat, and tugs on the ends of her ponytail. Now, there’s a mantra rocketing its way around her brain: _please don’t say you want to get back together, please don’t say you want to get back together_. 

Getting over Tim was one of the hardest things she’s ever done but now that she’s come out the other side, going back is the last thing she could ever see herself doing. 

But Tim doesn’t say anything and they sit in silence for several minutes, giving Steph the chance to take a good, long look at him. He seems older, somehow. She guesses they both do but it feels more defined with Tim. He’s sharper around the edges, these days -- it had scared her, the first time she saw Tim like this, but he’s settled into it better now that he’s not running on grief and caffeine and precious little else. 

The silence stretches on for a little too long, and Steph reaches out for something, anything, to break the silence. “You really need a haircut.” 

“I know, Kon won’t shut up about it,” Tim says. “But I don’t know, I kind of like it.” 

Steph screws up her nose, and makes a face. “Please don’t tell me there are things in the world that he and I agree on, that’s horrifying.” 

Now, Tim shakes his head, and she’s finally managed to shake a real laugh out of him. “You two don’t know each other at all and yet you’ve both separately decided that you’re the worst thing to happen to planet Earth. It’s ridiculous, you do know that, right?”

“He’s a butthead,” Steph says, and sniffs exaggeratedly. 

“He is kind of a butthead, I’ll give you that,” Tim says before lapsing into silence again. Steph reaches over and pinches him on the arm. 

“Ow, _what the hell_?” Tim cries out, rubbing the spot where she pinched him. 

Steph just levels him with a look. “Dude, seriously? What’s this about, Boy Wonder?” 

“I’m seeing someone,” Tim says, letting out a breath. 

“I’m not in love with you anymore,” Steph says, huffing a little. “It’s okay that you’re dating someone else, you know. I’m kind of dating someone else. I mean, there’s flirtations. And lame puns. Hot detectives. It’s a thing. ” 

“The someone is a guy,” Tim says all at once, like ripping off a band-aid. 

Steph turns and looks at him and stares blankly without blinking, and then, “it’s not Kon, is it?”

“What, no! God, _no_ , why is it that the first thing you asked?” Tim says, all but yelping. 

“I don’t know, we were just talking about him?” Steph says, throwing her hands up in the air. “And he’s your best friend and you always kind of talked about him annoyingly a lot, it seemed like the obvious question, okay!” 

Tim stares at her, like he’s not sure what else he’s supposed to say, and untwists his hands. “No, it’s not Kon. It’s, uh, it’s this guy I went to school with? His name is Bernard, he actually, uh, he goes to Gotham U, you might have classes together but that’s, that’s not really important.” 

“Wait,” Steph says, putting a name to a face in her mind because really, how many Bernards at Gotham U could there possibly be, “tall, blond, marketing major?” 

“Yeah, uh, that’s the one,” Tim says, tone cautious, like he’s not really sure where this is supposed to go next. 

Well. That makes two of them, then. 

“Huh,” Steph says, “he’s kinda cute,” because that feels safe and normal and like the only thing that she can say that won’t send Tim running for the fucking hills. 

Tim lets out a small, breathless laugh, as one hand lifts up to rub at the nape of his neck, his ears and neck turning a hilarious shade of pink. “Yeah, he is.” 

“Well, uh…….” Steph starts. “Congratulations on not having awful taste in men?”

Tim snorts. “Thanks. I think.” 

“So,” Steph begins awkwardly, “is the you saying that you’re, uh -- “ But Steph clams up, unsure how to go about finishing that sentence -- gay? Bisexual, like she’s starting to think she might be? Somewhere in between? 

Luckily, Tim finishes it for her. “Gay, yeah.” 

Steph hums. “Okay.” 

“You don’t seem shocked,” Tim says. “I kinda expected you to be shocked.”

Steph tugs a hand through her hair and thinks, really thinks about it because it’s weird that she’s not shocked and she knows it. “I should be, huh? It’s not like the thought ever occurred me before. But now that you’ve come out and said it, I guess….. I’m not surprised?”

“I didn’t…...I never lied to you,” Tim says, slowly, and he’s leaning into her, like he really needs her to hear this, so Steph leans right back. “I didn’t know until I knew, and I didn’t know until…..heh, a little more recently than I’d like to admit. And I…..Christ, Steph, you have to know how much I love you.” 

Steph reaches out, and grabs Tim’s hand. “Hey. I love you too, Boy Wonder,” she says, but her voice comes out a little thick and damnit, she’s not in the mood to start crying tonight. Steph shakes herself. “Well, I guess now I’ve solved the mystery of why you never got handsy with me when we made out.” 

Tim gives her a sharp look that she can’t read and then makes a face at her that oh yeah, that one she can read, that’s Tim Drake’s Annoyed Face Number Five. “Actually, I really was just that oblivious. The whole, you know, sex thing? I wasn’t even thinking about it at all. I wasn’t ready. I’m still not, to be honest.” 

“Well, when you are ready, don’t forget to use protection. I’m serious, Timbo, pregnancy is no joke,” Steph says, winking and Tim makes a noise that’s somewhere between an annoyed whine and a snort, and punches her lightly on the arm. “But I’ll be there for you, don’t you worry, I’ll hold your hand just like you held mine.” 

“You’re the worst,” Tim says, but he’s grinning, anyways. “I’m making you come to all of my lamaze classes.” 

“Nope. Once was enough for a lifetime,” Steph says, before tugging him in close and resting her head on his shoulder. “Hey, we’re cool, Boy Blunder.” 

“Thanks,” Tim says quietly, as he presses a soft kiss to the top of her head. 

They lapse into silence again, and this time, Steph doesn’t interrupt it.


End file.
